The woman checked into a hospital Friday morning after suffering from a fever. The hospital diagnosed it as a common cold but prescribed Tamiflu as a preventative measure.
However,
The doctors were quoted as saying that it was unclear whether the death was due to complications from the vaccine.
16 comments:
tamiflu isn't a vaccine.
Huge is correct. Tamiflu is an antiviral drug with limited effectiveness as some virus strains are resistant. Every single school in our district has at least one Swine Flu case, and we are staying open. Everyone is coming to school every day. We expect high absentee rates in October and November, but local hospitals are not stocking up on body bags as far as I know.
Anyone else think a general thinning of the world's population might be a good thing for everyone and our planet's health?
I'm 90% kidding.
I'd say that at the current trends, the human population will outweigh the total resources available on the planet within 60 to 70 years.
That would be coming to around the end of my life time, which I consider to be quite convenient, for my sake.
Anyone else think a general thinning of the world's population might be a good thing for everyone and our planet's health?
Not for our health, no. It takes a critical mass of free, empowered populations to sustain ourselves. Not enough people, and we won't be able to transmit our culture, secure our livelihoods and wellbeings, and whatnot. It isn't like we'd all just move to the woods and turn into Thoreau.
I think the best thing we can do to protect ourselves from the flu is to make sure our immune system is healthy. In particular, we need to make sure our Vitamin D levels are at healthy levels.
Huge, I've seen KT/KH really screw up vaccine, antibiotic, anti-viral, etc.
Once they had a deadline about Korea developing a generic flu vaccine. I was like "whoa". Something that protects against many strains of flu? That's a huge advance. But it turned out they were talking that Korea was just developing a generic version of Tamiflu. I emailed the article author explaining the difference between a vaccine and an anti-viral but crap load of good it did.
Grr they had a headline, not a deadline.
Tamar Korean women are somewhat notorious for having low vitamin d levels, owing to their avoidance of the sun. Although I'm skeptical most westerners don't get their RDA. You usually need about 20 minutes of sun exposure for your RDA although in winter in Seoul one might not get enough of the UV light.
Anyone know if they put vitamin D in milk in Korea?
"You usually need about 20 minutes of sun exposure for your RDA although in winter in Seoul one might not get enough of the UV light. "
Areas above the Tropic of Cancer (35 N) and Tropic of Capricorn (35 S) do not receive vitamin D-promoting UVB rays all year long. The further towards the pole from either latitude, the less UVB. Boston is about 45 N and gets no UVB for two months during the winter. Swedes have surprisingly high levels of vitamin D despite living so far north thanks to a diet of cold water fatty fish.
BTW, did you know that your body uses cholesterol to make vitamin D? If your cholesterol is too low, your body may not be able to make enough.
"Anyone know if they put vitamin D in milk in Korea?"
Don't know the answer, but I can tell you that the vitamin D used to fortify milk and other foods is a synthetic that isn't well-absorbed by the body. I take cod liver oil in the winter for its natural vitamin D.
@ Puffinwatch
"I was like "whoa". Something that protects against many strains of flu?"
- Yes, theoretically its possible. But yeah, that headline is misleading, and that mistake (in science news/medical news) is fairly common especially with so many untrained and science noobs journalists almost everywhere
I read a recent article in The Korea Times about Bae Yong-Joon having sepsis (a medical condition that affects the blood). It said, "he is in the early stage of food poisoning," instead of "blood poisoning." Haha! Pretty big difference. I actually emailed The Korea Times and got a pretty quick response that they'd edit the article.
Sonagi a molecule is a molecule. I'm not sure why a synthetic molecule would be any less efficacious than one from a natural source. Anything on pubmed to support that claim?
@Puffin:
I misstated the reason why vitamin D from cod liver oil and sunlight is better than from milk. It's not synthetic versus natural but the form, D3 versus D2. D3, found in cod liver oil and made by the body, is thought to be 3-4x more potent than D2, the traditional form used in fortified foods and supplements. A synthetic D3 is available and now being used in some supplements and foods.
http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/content/full/84/4/694
This paper supports your claim, Sonagi. It's good to know.
http://vitamind.ucr.edu/milk.html
This site does seem to indicate D3 is in North American milk. Not D2.
As well as this site:
http://www.dairygoodness.ca/en/health-professionals/dairy-nutrition/milk-products-and-health/why-cow-milk.htm
I guess at the end of the day it's important to look at the label and figure out if your milk is fortified with D2 or D3.
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